A Girl and Her Weather Radio

Just in case you don't know......Jackson is pretty much

in the high to moderate area for tonight's storms.

There are those people who really enjoy storms. These are the people who will sit on their front porches in their rocking chairs watching the clouds roll by. These are also the people who say "oh I hope there are storms tonight. I will be able to sleep so good!" Guess what........I am NOT one of those people!!

I am absolutely terrified of storms. I hear about storms that are going to come through in the middle of the night and I contemplate whether I should take a nap or not because I am going to be up all night. I should probably be a professional storm chaser, except I would have to do it from a VERY far off distance. Call me during a storm, I will be able to tell you exactly where it is, when it is going to be here, and for how long any watches or warnings are going to last. I am on top of it!

I will admit to you though that this fear has greatly increased during my time here in Jackson. One reason for this would be that no matter where a storm is in the United States it seems to always hit the Jackson area. The second reason would be that I don't know where I am here. I know that I live in North Jackson, and that is about all I could tell you. I am constantly going to Google maps to find out how close something is to me. The third reason is that I live on a third floor apartment. Just for the record I do not recommend this. When you live on the third floor it means that when there is a tornado warning you have to make your way down to the first floor apartments. You knock on the doors and wait until someone is gracious enough to let you in. Then you awkwardly stare at each other and wait for the warning to over, and secretly you are praying that the warning does not get extended because you want to be able to end the awkwardness. The fourth and main reason that fear has increased is because I am now responsible for myself.

I have always counted on my dad to let me know when it was time to come downstairs. If I ever woke up and heard thunder I would just role back over and go to sleep. I would just think to my self, "if it gets bad I know that dad will come and get me." Then when I would get the call to come downstairs the closet was already cleared out, I just had to crawl in. I didn't have to take care of myself, my dad was looking out for me. When the first set of storms for the season came through I quickly realized that I was going to have to take action, I was going to have to take care of myself! How does one do that you might ask? Of course you buy a weather radio!!

It is not nearly as nice to wake up to the obnoxiously loud siren on the weather radio as it is to my dad, but it gets the job done. I do as I have observed my dad do many times and reach for the remote and turn on the weather. I sit there and watch it until I know without a shadow of a doubt that I am in the clear. Then I roll over and go to sleep,or at least try to go to sleep.

I have a feeling that my little weather radio is going to be working overtime tonight and tomorrow but I am ready. I have my flashlight ready. I have batteries. And I have lower level neighbors who I am going to pray decide to let me in if it gets bad tonight. However, I am praying that none of this will be necessary!